MONTHLY 5 - August 2024

The month of August was the month of the Olympics, and outside of an enthusiastically happy blue man in drag, I didn't watch a single second of it. I did celebrate it in my own way by uncovering some officially licenced DOS games based on the 1996 event held in Atlanta. Atlanta 1996: Olympic Games + Olympic Soccer (1996 U.S. Gold Ltd & The Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG)) bundles the first 3D game based on the event with a rather standard football game which began a yearly series that would later take on the UEFA moniker. 

If you're not much or a sporty person, I've gathered some other games to keep your limbs from moving excessively. Continuing on from last month is the final mystery at Greveholm. The Mystery at Greveholm 3: The Old Legend (2000 Young Genius) returns to the first-person adventuring roots of the first game and is all the better for it. Ring II: Twilight of the Gods (2002 The Arxel Guild) on the other hand foregoes this style that defined its janky forebear to become a tank-controlled action adventure. At least the absolute weirdness of it all is still intact.

For something a little less fantastical, try the movie tie-in for Fantastic 4 (2005 Activision Publishing Inc, Marvel & Twentieth Century Fox), a flippantly entertaining beat-'em-up for a flippantly entertaining blockbuster. And if flippant doesn't cut it, check out Rising Lands (1997 Microïds), a real-time-strategy game that surprisingly crept up to become my personal pick of the month.

Enjoy!

MONTHLY 5 - July 2024

Politically speaking, July has been quite the wild month. France narrowly missed out on a sharp veer to the far right before the many Olympics snafus took over headlines, and the too-close-for-comfort Biden v Trump race took a swing to the Democrats as Biden stepped down in favour of his Vice President Kamala Harris. Better yet, 14 years of Tory rule has finally ended in the UK with Labour winning in a landslide (or more accurately the Tories lost rather than Labour won; the unfairly vilified Jeremy Corbin earned more votes in each of his previous elections). Time will tell on how our new P.M. fares, but surely it can't be worse than the Conservative chaos we've endured.

To commemorate such turmoil, I thought I'd go back to the mid-90s and see how other countries viewed our world leaders. South Korea to be precise, and I did so by playing a satirical one-on-one fighter that came out of their gaming industry called Hello, Mr. President! (1994 Open Planning Co., Ltd). I promise I won't talk about elections too much in the review, though no promises about Bill Clinton's wrestling undies.

Brighter times may be ahead right here on Earth, but until then let's leave it behind for some space-faring excitement starting with the on-rails shooter called Zeitgeist: Laser Fighter (1995-1996 Taito Corp), also called Jupiter Strike when it later hit the PlayStation (also included). With gameplay that has more than a hint of StarFox in its DNA, it's quite the hidden gem in my humble opinion.

Beyond that, I've been hankering more of my favourite genre; the point-and-click adventure. The oft-requested Ring: The Legend of the Nibelungen (1998 Cryo Interactive, Arxel Tribe & Carrière Multimédia) is a poorly designed yet artistically impressive take on Wagner's infamous opera. Except in space. And that's where we'll be going in The Mystery of Greveholm 2: Journey to Planutus (1999 Young Genius), a the sequel to last month's surprise pick of the month though with the drastic change in gameplay it won't hold that title this time round. That would go to yet another space adventure; Earthrise (1990 Matt Gruson). It's a neatly-designed independent take Sierra's early graphic adventure game design complete with the familiar cursor-based character controls and a slightly wobbly text parser.

Enjoy!

MONTHLY 5 - November 2022

This year has flown by. You blink, and it's the end of November! I've mostly been engrossed in God of War: Ragnarok since it came out, but the rest of my free time has been dedicated to The Collection Chamber. There are 5 great games featured this month so check out the obscure movie licenced FMV adventure (with too many arcade bits) Eraser Turnabout (1996 Imagination Pilots & Warner Bros.), the many versions of the underrated action platformer Fur Fighters (2000 Bizarre Creations Ltd), the Norse-themed role-playing sequel Heimdall 2: Into the Hall of Worlds (1994 Core Design), a classic point-and-click adventure starring everone's favourite sleuth The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Serrated Scalpel (1992 Mythos Software & Electronic Arts) and Bill Plympton's Take Your Best Shot (1995 7th Level Inc) a desktop toy based on his award-winning 1991 short Push Comes to Shove.

There are a couple of revisions too. Kiss: Psycho Circus - The Nightmare Child now uses a Windows 10 patch instead of dxWnd granting it better compatibility. I've also added a scan of the manual too. The Neverhood has also been revised updating ScummVM and fixing some save-game and screenshot annoyances. If you've not played either before, give them a go. They're pretty good.

To try the others, head on past the jump and dive in.

MONTHLY 5 - September 2022

It's a Viking invasion!!!

I've gone nutty for all things Nordic thanks to a memorable but all-too-brief trip to Norway earlier this month. And I couldn't let it slide without playing some games featuring the history and mythology of that spectacular country. The Norse god Thor is on a quest to defeat the evil goddess Hel in the difficult Amiga platformer Fire and Brimstone (1990 Vectordean Ltd & Firebird). In other news, a nameless hero is on his own quest to steal that god's magical mallet in the action-heavy shareware RPG Thor's Hammer Trilogy (1995 Escape Programming). I'm sure the same gaggle of gods will crop up in another RPG; Heimdall (1992 Core Design) playable on almost all systems it released on. On a less mythical note, Vikings: Adventure out of Time (1998 Index+) educades about the real lives of berserkers from the North in an entertaining fashion. Alternatively, Vikings: The Strategy of Ultimate Conquest (1996 1996 Random Games, Inc) attempts the same but as a strategy game complete with a healthy dose of Michael Dorn.

You may have noticed a little sidebar on the right-hand side detailing the most recently updated games. I thought it would be a good thing to keep a track of it here. Two games have been updated since last time. For those having trouble running Disney's The Lion King 2: Simba's Pride - GameBreak and The Museum of Anything Goes, these new packages may help with that. Make sure to read the included ChamberNotes text file included with each install for more information.

If you ever get a chance to visit Bergen, I can't recommend it enough. If you don't, travel on past the jump to discover it in gaming form.

5 GAMES FOR JANUARY 2019

In the first of my batch of monthly mini-reviews, we have a variety of gamestyles to keep you busy. There's the action-strategy of Airborne Ranger, some Norse god role playing in Dusk of the Gods, some mini-game shenanigans in Jumanji: A Jungle Adventure Game Pack, some explosive combat racing in L.A. Blaster and to top it off, why not beat some wrestlers up in WWF: In Your House.